The Israeli Heritage Ministry has allocated NIS 1 million to locate the legendary Altalena shipwreck, a vessel sunk in 1948 during the War of Independence, aiming to restore it as a national symbol of Irgun valor.
Israel has reignited the search for the Altalena, one of the most divisive symbols in the country’s history. The Heritage Ministry has invested NIS 1 million in an ambitious effort to uncover the wreckage of the ship, sunk under dramatic and tragic circumstances in June 1948.
The mission has been entrusted to the Israel Oceanographic and Limnological Research Institute, which will use the national research vessel Bat Galim, fitted with cutting-edge marine detection technology, to scan the Mediterranean seabed. At present, the project remains in its preliminary phase, focusing on pinpointing the location of the remains.
The matter resurfaced during a recent government meeting, where Justice Minister Yariv Levin stressed:
“The ship must be found and turned into a symbol of the Revisionists’ bravery.”
The Altalena, operated by the Irgun (Etzel), carried nearly 900 Jewish immigrants and a large weapons cache destined for Israel’s independence struggle. In a defining moment of early statehood conflict, the ship was shelled and sunk by the IDF on the orders of Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion, amid the fragile first ceasefire of the War of Independence.
For decades, the Altalena has remained a flashpoint of memory and ideology — a symbol of both national division and sacrifice. Now, with state-backed funding and advanced marine science, Israel moves closer to recovering this historic relic from beneath the waves.
